I’m still here, and I’m fine – it’s just
been a very busy time this winter and spring, and a time of some transition and reflection in
my life too.
In mid-March, we lost my father, Richard “Dick” Parker, who passed away peacefully at his home in Maryland at the age of 99 ½. My family and I were away from home off and on during his last couple of months this winter, helping him as best we could, and then going through the aftermath of celebrating his life, mourning him and helping put his affairs to rest.
Needless to say, these moments in the life of a person and a family require much of our time, attention and emotional resources while they’re happening, and for a while afterward too. I haven’t had much energy or focus left over for this blog so far this year, or for my music, while we were going through all this. But I believe most of that period is now behind me, and I’m looking forward to getting back to some of my creative interests.
There is also an unexpected new writing project on my plate, as the result of a “gift” (ha!) I received last Christmas from my son and daughter-in-law. The present was a one-year subscription to an unusual online organization you may have heard about called “Storyworth”.
Storyworth is a service that provides a way for a person (like myself) to be asked a series of questions, roughly one per week for a year, as a catalyst for writing stories about one’s life, thoughts and personal history. The questions can come from whoever gave you the gift (such as your children), or can be picked off a huge list that the service provides, or even selected or made up by the writer.
The idea is to spend a year answering 50 questions or so, and at the end, Storyworth will then produce a book out of it, for circulation to those among your family and friends who are interested. It’s sort of an “autobiography in a box” concept, where the structure is more or less provided for you, and it's conversational, rather than the usual chronological narrative we would expect in an autobiography. There are other nice options too, like the ability to add photographs to supplement the articles you’ve written.
I thought this would be relatively easy, but it turns out to be more time-consuming and challenging than I would have thought. For one thing, it’s easy to fall behind, and for another, giving good, well-structured and interesting written answers, even three or four pages per question, is surprisingly hard work! But on the other hand, I’m finding it very enjoyable, and it has triggered a fascinating process of introspection, one that provides a reason for me to go back and revisit the details of many memories and different phases of my life.
I don’t expect to be publishing or sharing this Storyworth body of work with the public – it’s really intended for a small audience of my close family and friends. But I take it seriously just the same, and hope to do it well. So that’s one writing project already taking time away from the blog, and from my music, at least for the next year or so.
By the way, if that sounds interesting, and you think you or someone in your family or life might enjoy trying to write a Storyworth book too, you can find out more about it at https://www.storyworth.com . I heard an ad for it on NPR last week, and I’ve been seeing ads for it on Instagram too, so apparently it’s becoming a thing. Check it out! It’s fun, and it could be a treasure for your family that might be valued by later generations, as well as a paper-based contribution to the archives and history of our times.
Despite the demands of my Storyworth project, I do want to resume my writing for this blog. I have been saving a list of a number of things I’ve read and watched during the past half year that I’m very excited to share with you, so there will be new posts coming soon, as quickly as I can get my thoughts together and start putting them in readable form. I am also hoping to resume my musical and video projects at some point in the near future.
One of the things I’ve learned over the past four years, since I started this “life of the artist” after I retired, is that art and creativity don’t always need to happen on a predictable or consistent schedule, and indeed, probably often can’t. They happen instead more in sync with the rhythms and seasons of the artist’s life and moods.
It’s taken me a while, after a long professional career where everything was always planned and on a tight production schedule, to realize I have the freedom now (as a retired person) to do as much or as little as I can, and to do it only when I desire or find the inspiration. But I’m getting more comfortable with that idea.
I will have my next review post up soon. Thanks for sticking with me, and with The Memory Cache.
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